


2 Promises

by captainamergirl



Category: Passions (TV)
Genre: Bittersweet Ending, F/M, Gwen asks Hank to grant her dying wishes, Sacrifice, prepare for tears
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-17
Updated: 2017-09-17
Packaged: 2018-12-30 23:48:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12119949
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/captainamergirl/pseuds/captainamergirl
Summary: Gwen secures two important promises from her husband, Hank. A bittersweet one shot.





	2 Promises

**2 Promises**  
 _  
“If it comes down to it, Hank, I want you to save this baby. I want you to save our little girl.”_  
  
Hank squeezed her hand. A well of emotion clogged his throat. She had lain in this hospital bed for four days; seeming to grow paler with each second that ticked by. "Gwen, don’t - don’t talk like that,” he choked out.  
  
“If it comes to that point, Hank… If it becomes a choice between her and me, I want you to choose our little girl. I want you to choose our little Ellie, okay?”  
  
An unwelcomed tear slipped down his stubbled cheek but he made no effort to wipe it away. “You know it’s not going to come to that point, Gwen.”  
  
“Well, if it does… Pick Ellie, okay? I’ve lived a good life and she deserves a chance to live hers.”  
  
“Gwen, don’t talk like that.”  
  
She went on, almost as if she hadn’t heard his protest. “Before you burst into my life and brought with you all of that wonderful color and chaos, I wouldn’t have been able to say I had a good life. I was miserable. So sad; so filled with anger and malice. You showed me how to embrace every single day and see it as a new opportunity. Your love… The way you loved me … It's _everything.”_  
  
He buried his face in the soft curve of her shoulder. Her fingers came up to feather in his thick, sandy-brown hair. “Hank, promise me you’ll save Ellie.”  
  
He lifted his head to look into her dewy chestnut eyes. “I love you, Gwen. How am I supposed to let you go if - if worse comes to worst?”  
  
“You have to, Hank. You have to choose our daughter. Promise me that Ellie will get to live … to thrive… To know the wonder of being protected and loved by you.”  
  
“Please, please don’t make me do this,” he cried, another tear dashing down his face.  
  
“Promise me, Hank. _Please.”_  
  
“I … I promise,” he said. He felt, in that moment, that he had somehow signed away his soul; his very heart. He was beyond devastated; beyond crushed. It was as if a literal two-ton weight sat on his broad shoulders, pushing him down, down, down...  
  
Gwen pressed her lips to his cheek. They felt impossibly dry; cracked; _cold._ He was losing her already, he thought. He couldn’t stand it.  
  
His large hands secured around her waist and he held her to him as tightly as he dared. “I love you, Gwen,” he whispered hoarsely.  
  
“I love you too, Hank… Now, I have to ask you one more favor.”  
  
“No…”  
  
 _“Yes.”_ Her fingers whispered across his arm like a soft breeze he almost thought he had imagined.  
  
“What - what is it?” He asked. If he sounded wary, it was because he was.  
  
“Promise me … That you’ll love again. That you’ll find someone else and love her the way that you did me.”  
  
“No! I could never do that. Ever!”  
  
“Hank…”  
  
“You’re asking too much of me, Gwen. You’re acting like you know you’re dying. You know you aren’t though. Dr. Russell -”  
  
“Is a good doctor, but even she can’t work miracles. Now promise me. Please. I know that you’ve already done so much for me; that I’ve asked far too much of you, but I need to hear you say this. I need to hear you promise that you won’t mourn me forever; that you won’t be alone. Ellie will need a whole man for a father and there is someone else out there needing your special brand of caring, just like I did.”  
  
“Gwen, baby, stop. You’re killing me… _You’re killing me!”_  
  
“I just want you to have a good life, Hank. I need to know you’ll be fulfilled and happy. The way you’ve made me. I was so broken before you came into my life… Now I’ve realized every one of my dreams. Even ones I didn’t know I had way back then.”  
  
“And what about _my_ dreams?” He asked. “In every one of my dreams, you are there. You and our daughter. We’re all together.”  
  
“I know. God, I know.” A tear dashed down her own cheek and he gingerly reached up to catch it on his thumb. “But I need you to make new dreams, alright? Make new dreams with our little girl and someone who is worthy of her and you. Someone who is worthy of your great, big heart.”  
  
He couldn't answer her. Not then. He instead pressed his lips to hers - urgently, desperately. He needed to be close to her. She returned the kiss for a moment with equal fervor and then he felt her go slack against him. She fell back against the cushion of pillows behind her. Her eyes slammed shut.   
  
“Gwen!” He screamed. “Gwen, no!” He reached blindly for the call button, but in his fumbling desperation, he dropped it onto the floor. The cord fell somewhere beneath the bed. He howled in frustration as he raced for the open door.  
  
He yelled for help. _Someone - God, anyone - please help!_  
  
Dr. Russell came careening into the room in the next minute, followed by a team of nurses in matching blue scrubs. Hank was pushed to the far corner of the room. His back hit the wall hard and he slid down it as his legs finally gave out beneath him.  
  
“We need to get her into surgery right now,” he heard Eve say, but her voice sounded so far away. He just stared at his wife; what he could see of her through the mesh of people and medical equipment and contraptions.  
  
Eve gave him a sympathetic look as she and the nurses pushed the gurney holding Hank’s whole world out the door. At one point, he was sure that Gwen opened her eyes for half a second, stared at him, saw him the way only she could. And he shouted, “I promise. _I promise!”_  
  
Xoxox  
  
Five hours later, Hank found himself standing over an isolette. He gazed down at a squirming little bundle of pink with a head full of soft, blonde curls. Ellie looked exactly like her mother. That knowledge broke him and healed him all at once. As he looked into the little infant's wide brown eyes, he knew that he couldn’t regret his decision to save his daughter; to give Gwen one of her dying wishes. The other promise he’d made… Well, that one would take some time to fulfill; maybe most of his lifetime even. Someday he’d find the courage to love someone again though.   
_  
Just not yet._  
  
He felt a strong, steady hand come to rest on his shoulder. He turned to see his best friend Luis standing at his elbow. “Hank, hey,” Luis said. “I came as soon as I heard.” Hank detected no pity in his friend’s words, but rather simple concern, and he was glad for it.  
  
“T-thanks,” Hank said. “Thanks for being here.”  
  
“There’s nowhere else I’d be right now,” Luis said. He looked at the baby then. “She’s a beaut, Hank. She looks just like-” He broke off.  
  
“No, you can say it, Luis.”  
  
“Alright. She looks just like Gwen.”  
  
“She does. And it’s okay, because I want to remember Gwen. I never want to forget her and this amazing gift she gave me.”  
  
Hank gently lifted the infant, cradling her soft little body against his proud chest. She stared up at him with inquisitive eyes. It was almost as if she knew that he was her father; the one living person in all of the world who would always do his damndest to protect her.  
  
“Welcome to the world, Ellie. Ellie _Gwen_ Bennett,” he amended, liking the feel of her name on his tongue. “It can be a real kick in the pants sometimes, but I promise… We’ll make it through somehow, _together.”_ **  
**


End file.
